


Begone, My Daylight

by wubghost



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: AU, Adam is not, Alternate Universe, Ensemble - Freeform, Gen, Pepper is The Antichrist, The Them - Freeform, but he's still important
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-06
Updated: 2016-03-06
Packaged: 2018-05-25 04:55:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6180976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wubghost/pseuds/wubghost
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wherein Adam isn't the <i>anti</i>christ, and Pepper is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Begone, My Daylight

In the non-existence of the time before time, there was no light nor shadow. Then came Lucifer, Lightbringer, he most revered and holy, an angel wrapped in the cold warmth of far-off stars. Silver trailed his every step, gold crowned his sun-bright wings, and looking on him was like seeing every sunset in all possible worlds.  In heaven, he shone. In hell, he burned.

No wonder his daughter is made of fire.

*

Sharp leaves and grey dust swept through the air, buoyed by a gale so harsh it felt more like a living thing. War smiled, clean, immaculate, untouched, and Pepper tasted sparks in her teeth. “Little girl,” War cooed, sultry voice cutting through the air like a blade, knowing she needn’t raise it to be heard; physics were a mere suggestion to those of her ilk.

War held out her hand, nails dipped in fresh blood and gore, copper curling into the air. Pepper blinked, smelt the scent of dust and concrete and War’s nails shone with fresh-painted polish that will last unto eternity and never chip. Red hair framed her body like the bloody pantomime of a halo, thick tendrils grasping at the air like desperate fingers. The smile she gave Pepper was as sharp as a surgeon’s scalpel. All of her was sharp, from her sharp-winged eyes to her sharp elbows to her sharp hips hidden under a scarlet dress. A most exquisite blade with a hilt wrapped in red, and Pepper’s hands itched to test how well she cuts. The hand on Ada’s flank pressed deeper into her dark fur, and the hand at her side curled into a loose fist.

Pepper stood her ground, squinted at the woman-shaped being before her. Green eyes narrowed, not in suspicion but in thought. “I know you.” Like War, Pepper didn’t raise her voice, yet she knew it reached the intended recipient all the same.

“Of course you do,” War replied, and hearing her was like running your hand under the sharp edge of an obsidian blade. “We come from the same father.”

*

Scuffed sneakers kicked at battered milk crates as the Them bickered companionably in the light of the setting sun. Adam didn’t exactly watch her, but half his attention was on Brian and Wens, half on Pepper. The weight of his intent settled on her shoulders like a blanket without the warmth, more welcome in the oppressive summer heat.

Something stirred in the back of her mind. White light and fire, and the urge to _do._ Do what, she wasn’t sure, but her bones sang and her knuckles felt like maces, her nails like spikes. The world was a battlefield, and she was a weapon; there was so _much_ that could be used to hurt, and it’d be so easy. A broken piece of wood, a sharp rock, a wineglass. Warmth pooled in her stomach, spread to her chest, her neck, and the sweat that inched out of every pore wasn’t enough to cool her down.

“Pep.” She looked up at Adam’s blue eyes and tousled hair, purity embossed in his every cell. “You okay?”

It felt wrong, all of it felt wrong, especially him, so perfect and unmarred even with dirt smudged on his face and bare legs. The _world_ felt wrong, so perfect and idyllic, and it’d be easy to raze it all to ash, just the four of them, Adam as their leader, she his sword, Wens the tactician and Brian the shield. So easy, and her feet ached to march, to dance in red and laugh as the sound of mayhem echoed around her—

“Course’ I am,” she said crossly and shook his hand off her shoulder.

*

An angel and a demon step out of a car.

By this point, the car was less of a car and more of a flaming wreck, and technically the demon was the only one who stepped _out_ of the car, seeing as the angel had arrived through other means, but “a demon stepped out of a flaming hunk of metal that used to be a car while an angel waited outside” didn’t sound as catchy.

“Bout’ time you showed up,” Adam said, skinny arms crossed over his narrow chest. It shouldn’t look imposing, especially with the body of an eleven year old boy, but seeing as he was God’s most beloved, first among equals, the messiah of Christendom, savior of humankind, it worked just as well. The last time Aziraphale saw him—the last time he’d been mortal—there’d been nails driven into his palms and he’d screamed betrayal at the sky, begged his father to let the pain end. Then, he’d been dark haired and brown skinned, bigger and larger with more time to grow before he had to attend to his calling, but the holiness that ebbed from his aura was still the same.

Beside him, Crowley’s physical form stayed tense and still, but Aziraphale felt his metaphysical flinch, and somehow the thought of the demon curling smaller and smaller within his damned soul made the angel’s chest ache—but no, there were more important things to worry about.

“Er,” he said, and allowed himself the small comfort of resting his hand on Crowley’s shoulder.

Crowley didn’t shake him off, so the hand stayed. “Yeah, yeah, late as always,” the demon muttered as the remains of the Bentley collapsed into a smouldering wreck. Aziraphale chanced a glance at the commotion before them; a few steps away, two boys stood behind a girl that looked like liquid fire given human form, red hair waving in the air like a torch. A hellhound looking hopelessly lost dwarfed her far side while War stood before her, red lips pulled back in a smile meant to hurt. Death watched from a safe distance, and Pollution and Famine were nowhere to be seen.

Je—Adam shrugged, and turned back to what Aziraphale couldn’t help but think of as his disciples. “That’s alright. You two’re here to witness, that’s all.”

The splendour of an Archangel buried deep within a human shell. If Aziraphale sharpened his mind, let his eyes drift, a faint suggestion of wings momentarily swam into focus. Even without all that, Adam was perfect, more than perfect, the kind of perfection that made people look twice to check if he was real, but the rest of him was so blindingly _human._ Goosebumps trailed along his skinny arms, disappeared under small hands as he hugged himself against the onslaught of wind. Despite his blasé tone, his back was hunched in worry, and a young face still untrained in the nuances of human emotions watched the other children with undisguised attention.

Crowley sank closer to him, pretended to not notice as Aziraphale’s hand moved to his far shoulder. Aziraphale, in turn, stayed silent as Crowley’s hand crawled across his lower back and hugged his waist. “Shouldn’t you be there with them?” Crowley asked in a tone that tried to be scathing but came out tired.

Him against her, the shepherd and the wolf. Even without tapping into his innate angelic knowledge, Aziraphale knew they were close, closer than close, the four of them tangled in a hopelessly complicated knot.

“Yeah,” Adam replied without turning his head. “Roles to play and all.” He didn’t move, didn’t elaborate, but the implication was still there, and Aziraphale felt Crowley’s soul burn with the knowledge of what he’d done. It must weigh heavy on his mind, the poor thing, and Aziraphale lightly extended metaphysical fingers, combed over the tense mass until he relaxed somewhat.

“Funny,” the angel finally said after a few long heartbeats, “How you and her grew up together.”

Crowley squeezed his waist in warning, but the tense line of Adam’s shoulders relaxed a small fraction. “Suppose so,” he agreed. “Dad always had a weird sense of humour.”

*

A few steps away, Pepper and War may as well be in their own world.

“Come,” War said, her hand still out. “Take my hand. Let me show you what you can do.”

Pepper clutched at Ada’s fur, tried to think through the fog in her mind. Smoke and ash crawled down her throat, coated her in grime, and the smell of sulphur rested on her tongue even as the debris and shrapnel flung about by the wild air gave her a wide berth. “I…”

War stepped closer, hips swaying, one long leg after the other, so beautiful it hurt, so lovely that looking at her was like looking at a monster. “Don’t be afraid,” she cooed. “None can hurt you. The world is yours for the taking.”

And it sounded so _nice,_ to own it all, to have hundreds of thousands grovel at her feet. “The world is yours,” War repeated, “And so am I. Take my hand, and all this—“ she gestured at the airbase, at the columns of smoke in the horizon, “—will bow at your feet.”

A partnership, blood and fire tearing all to ash. And it’s _true,_ all she said, of course it was, this whole stinking earth _owed_ her, everyone owed her, and they ought to all kneel, ought to exult her as their queen. Pepper didn’t need a king, she was enough on her own, though of course she would give Brian and Adam and Wens favours if they behaved, and

“Pepper,” Brian whimpered behind her.

A partnership, and it wasn’t right. If she was taking over the world with anyone it’d be with the Them, not this woman who wasn’t a woman. Even now, as she watched, War seemed to slip in and out of her human skin. Besides, the world was awfully big, and dealing with the lot of it sounded like more trouble than it was worth.

Pepper stepped back, and Ada growled low in her chest.

“No.”

The howling wind stilled. War’s expectant face slowly morphed into one of blank incomprehension. She blinked once, then again, hand still out.

“What?”

“No,” Pepper repeated, unconsciously huddling closer to Ada’s warmth, to Brian and Wens’ silent support behind her. “I won’t do it.”

Slowly, War retracted her arm. She seemed sharper now, somehow, every edge made of razor blades, and the soft rasp of the bloodied sword she still clutched in her other hand against cracked concrete shrieked in the still air.

“You,” she said, saccharine sweet, “Can’t escape your duty.”

Pepper took another step back, hands curled around the makeshift stick at her side. “Yes,” she said, stubborn and defiant. “Yes I can. I have a _choice.”_

War laughed, bright and sharp like a new wound. “You were born for this!” Her eyes were fever-bright, more a suggestion than a feature, and there was no way she could be mistaken for human now. “We could wreck devastation. We could crush the world beneath our hands. All of Earth, all of humanity—all at your command.”

“No,” Pepper repeated, and brandished her stick, shaking legs spread to prevent herself from further retreat.

When War next spoke, her words were lined with burnished steel, sharp as a whip in the sudden quiet air. “Foolish girl. Famine is slow, Pollution young, and banishing them is no feat. Me? I live inside you all. Old age, disease, accidents—none surpass me in feeding Death. My comrades are a consequence, and I am who they bow to. I am War. I _am_ humanity. I have existed since the days of old and will exist as long as there is strife and anger. You, young thing—do you truly think you can defeat me?”

A hundred thousand words crowded Pepper’s mind; _yes, you big bully,_ and _I’m not scared of you,_ and _yea, you’re old, but I’m as strong as you an’ you’ve got no business bossing me around like this._ She clutched her makeshift sword so hard it hurt, knuckles white around dead wood, and looked War right in the eye.

“No,” she said, and threw the stick.

*

All in all, it was a rather anticlimactic apocalypse.

Outside the open window of Jasmine Cottage, a slight breeze worked tirelessly to keep things comfortable as the sun stared relentlessly down at Lower Tadfield. Chirping birds filled the air, and trees whispered at each other in their slow, ancient language, perfectly at ease in languidness. The sound of laughing children could be heard on the beaten dirt path that passed for a road, all worries gone because a day like this went on forever and it’d be a shame to waste it. Every part of the small town was picture-perfect as always, the epitome of a small English village.

It was a nice day.

Newt wrapped his arms around Anathema’s waist, head resting on her shoulder. They watched as four children ran past, one with a head of gold, one with a head of fire, a large black dog nipping at their heels. Adam and Pepper were as old as this world, but you’d be hard pressed to tell unless you were of the supernaturally inclined, which Newt certainly wasn’t. Already his recollection of events were blurred at the edges.

“What do you think they’ll do now?” He asked.

Anathema hummed thoughtfully and leaned back against his chest. She, unlike him, was of the supernaturally inclined, yet the precognition abilities of her ancestor seemed to have missed her, which she was not-so-secretly thankful for. Still, when she replied, her voice was nothing but confident.

“Live, of course.”


End file.
